


The Last Night

by s_syncopate



Category: Homeland
Genre: Bittersweet Ending, But honest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-11
Updated: 2017-04-11
Packaged: 2018-10-17 17:49:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10599069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/s_syncopate/pseuds/s_syncopate
Summary: The night in the attic, 6x11.  It takes Carrie watching Quinn sleep to help her accept some things.





	

I watch you sleeping. You are curved over yourself, restless and floppy. You are this way because of me.

You shift on the window sill, trying ineffectively to find a place of comfort. Your fucking jacket doesn’t fit you right; too short in the sleeves even though your shoulders don’t stand tall like they used to. 

Because of me. 

I’m so thankful you brought me here so we could yell and scream and blame. I was waiting, maybe wanting, for you to push me around again. Because that’s who we are to each other, isn’t it? Rag dolls to clutch onto in this fucked up world we’ve made for ourselves. 

At least we’re not alone in the dark.

I can’t take any of it back. Not Berlin. Not Brody. I dragged you across the world, yanked you and toyed with you, pulling, pulling, pulling. And look at you now; limp and tattered and worn. 

It makes me think of Hop. Fucking Hop. That stupid bunny - I got it for Franny when she had pneumonia because it reminded me of the story my mom used to read me when I was sick: The Velveteen Rabbit. That bunny was ragged, like us. It wanted so badly to be real and the only way it could be that way was to have the rest of its life fall so sadly away. 

What did the skin horse say? “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in your joints and very shabby.”

Still worthy, though. More so than ever. 

Eyes closed, your body heaves itself off the window, wavering in air, looking for a place to fall. The window sill creaks as I sit down next you and let your weight fall heavy onto mine. 

Has anyone ever been there to catch you, Quinn?

Your head lulls, and I shuffle over so that if falls to my shoulder. I’m used to you towering over me. I always thought it was fitting, you having the high ground, the better view of things. I liked it that way. You seem smaller now, more compact. Every jagged scar is visible, shining silver in the moonlight.

The space around us is cold and damp, but together, we are warm. Your breath doesn’t have to travel far to fall hot on my face. It’s sour and sweet, like a child’s when they’re on the verge of illness; reserves of white blood cells already crossing over battle lines, searching out the violent, shadowy things that don’t belong. But I see now. I understand. You have too many, don’t you?  
The battle is already lost. 

In this silence of your head rising and falling on my shoulder, I reach down your arm, out past your sleeve that is too short, and grab hold to your hand, this one that still responds.  
It flinches before the fingers splay themselves wide, letting mine come in between. There is blood on yours. Mine too. Faded, but never into oblivion. 

When we clutch them tight together, I can’t see what’s on the other side. 

I will remember this hand as it was, when it stroked my cheek on the warm night full of promise. You and your glossy white truck, fresh as my grief. Like shadows burnt onto the walls of Hiroshima, that night, that touch, will remain. 

That was real, you see. And once something is real, it stays that way forever. 

It can never be forgotten.

**Author's Note:**

> Quote from "The Velveteen Rabbit" by Margery Williams.


End file.
